Chapter 107: True Extra: Gender-Swap Arc Part Two
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Sasuke looked up and indeed saw Uzumaki Naruto with his messy mop of blond hair standing at the noodle shop entrance, face overflowing with an excessively bright smile, staring directly at his Yuuna-nee.
His good mood instantly dissipated by more than half, heart inexplicably irritated.
Didn't this guy always insist on Ichiraku Ramen? Why did he have to come here today of all days?
As the saying goes, smiles don't disappear—they just transfer from one person's face to another's.
Right now, Naruto was exactly like this.
He'd originally just been curious about the new shop's taste. He hadn't expected to encounter a huge surprise upon pushing open the door—Yuuna-nee was actually here too!
To this day, Naruto still clearly remembered that afternoon.
When he was starving with no money for food, it was Yuuna-nee who'd treated him to a steaming bowl of ramen.
More importantly, she was the first person who hadn't looked at him with disgust or fear.
That calm gaze carrying slight gentleness was like the first ray of light shining into his life.
Hearing the voice, Yuuna looked up. Seeing it was Naruto, her face showed a gentle smile. "It's Naruto—what a coincidence. This shop's taste really is quite good."
Hearing Yuuna's affirmation, Naruto's eyes brightened as he immediately climbed up the offered pole. "Really? Then I want to try it too! Yuuna-nee, can I sit here?" He pointed at the empty seat beside Sasuke, completely ignoring the cold gaze the latter instantly shot his way.
"No." Sasuke preemptively said coldly.
"Eh? Why not! There's clearly an empty seat!" Naruto protested dissatisfiedly, hands on hips. "The noodle shop isn't owned by your family!"
"Shut up, dead-last." Sasuke's brow furrowed tightly, completely unyielding. "It just isn't okay."
Seeing the two start arguing the moment they met again, Yuuna sighed softly and stepped in to mediate. "Alright, Sasuke. Naruto is at least your classmate. Sit down, it's fine."
"Hmph." Sasuke extremely unhappily turned his face away, but since Yuuna had spoken, he no longer objected.
Naruto immediately sat down cheerfully, even deliberately scooting his chair toward Yuuna's direction and smugly glancing at Sasuke.
He enthusiastically found a topic. "Yuuna-nee, what noodles did you order? Are they good?"
"Signature ramen—the taste is very good." Yuuna answered with a smile.
"Then I want a signature ramen too!" Naruto immediately shouted to the server, then continued looking eagerly at Yuuna. "Um... Yuuna-nee, are you free this afternoon? I know a newly opened training ground—I heard it's really interesting..."
"She's not free." Sasuke again stiffly interrupted, eyes sharply sweeping toward Naruto. "We're training this afternoon."
"I wasn't asking you!" Naruto was so angry he nearly jumped up. He turned to look at Yuuna with pitiful eyes. "Yuuna-nee..."
Yuuna looked at these two confrontational boys before her and smiled somewhat helplessly, thinking they were just having another spat.
"I do have some things to handle this afternoon." She said gently to Naruto. Seeing his shoulders immediately droop, she added, "However, next time we can go check out that new training ground you mentioned together with Sasuke."
"Really? It's a promise!" Naruto immediately rekindled hope.
"Mm." Yuuna nodded.
Sasuke ate his noodles with his head down to the side, heart both stifled and irritated.
This dead-last was really too much of an eyesore! He secretly glanced at Yuuna's gentle profile and secretly decided: From now on, I absolutely must watch more carefully and give this blond idiot absolutely no opportunity!
He knew all too clearly how easily someone as gentle and beautiful as Yuuna-nee—almost unreal in her existence—attracted the opposite sex's attention, whether boys or adults.
Yet the person in question paid it no mind whatsoever.
Her temperament was indifferent. Normally she either sat quietly reading in the courtyard or drank tea alone, as if lacking interest in everything around her.
In Sasuke's eyes, such a Yuuna-nee was undoubtedly very innocent. She simply wouldn't know what impure thoughts might hide behind those men's gazes.
But not everyone was an upstanding gentleman like himself.
This awareness largely stemmed from an "accidental enlightenment."
Recently, "Make-Out Paradise" had been secretly circulating among the boys. He'd accidentally flipped through a few pages.
That book's content could be said to have opened the door to a new world for him, also giving him his initial understanding and wariness about those subtle matters between men and women.
And the book's plots about "stealing someone's lover" invisibly deepened his vigilance toward this blond kid before him.
Why?
Because Sasuke gloomily discovered that in the stories, those characters who appeared halfway through and stole the protagonist's beloved—eight or nine out of ten had blond hair!
While the poor soul kept in the dark who ended up sadly heartbroken always had black hair just like his own...
This deadly "coincidence" made it hard for him not to be vigilant!
This thought circled in Sasuke's mind, making him angrier the more he thought about it.
Looking at Naruto's eye-catching blond hair, the more he looked the more he found it offensive.
This naturally evil blond brat! I'll just...
"Sasuke?"
Yuuna's gentle voice softly reached him, carrying a trace of worry.
Sasuke suddenly snapped awake from that nameless anger. Looking up, he met Yuuna's gaze.
Her beautiful eyes held concern as she quietly reminded, "Your eyes..."
Sasuke instinctively looked down at the noodle broth before him—on the clear soup surface, a pair of crimson eyes was clearly reflected, single tomoe slowly rotating within.
His heart jumped in alarm. Only then did he realize that under his earlier emotional fluctuation, he'd unconsciously activated his Sharingan.
The reflection in the soup made Sasuke somewhat flustered. He immediately closed his eyes, forcibly suppressing the ocular power.
When he opened them again, his pupils had returned to ink-black.
He wanted to cover it up, but as a fellow Uchiha clan member, Yuuna understood all too well—unless deliberately guided, Sharingan would only activate on its own during violent emotional upheaval.
"I'm fine." Sasuke avoided her gaze and said quietly.
Yuuna didn't speak, only those calm eyes still carrying gentle inquiry, lingering on his face.
This gaze made Sasuke feel guilty.
Yuuna-nee never belonged to him alone. She was so wonderful—she should naturally have her own friends and life. Yet just now, because of Naruto's appearance, he'd developed such strong possessiveness and even lost control to the point of activating his Sharingan...
A sense of self-loathing surged up.
He didn't want to worry her, much less let her see those dark, unspeakable thoughts of his.
Sasuke suddenly lowered his head, stirring the noodles in his bowl with chopsticks, dryly squeezing out:
"It's the noodles... the noodles were too delicious. Got a bit excited."
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